362 PROTEIN POISONS 



No. 3. 40 c.c. was injected. The respiration became 

 difficult and the animal quite limp. The right side was 

 found to be paralyzed, but the animal lived for two hours, 

 when it died with failure of respiration, and without a 

 movement. The heart was dilated and contained dark, 

 fluid blood. Anemic areas were seen in the lungs and the 

 muscles also were anemic. 



Van Alstyne and Grant 1 injected dilute egg-white intra- 

 venously into a dog and sensitized guinea-pigs with blood 

 drawn from one-quarter to seventy-two hours. Pearce 2 

 injected foreign proteins intravenously into rabbits, and 

 sensitized guinea-pigs with organ extracts. His conclusions 

 are stated as follows: "Extracts of the kidneys of normal 

 rabbits prepared one, two, three, and four days after the 

 intravenous injection of egg albumen and horse serum have 

 the power to sensitize guinea-pigs to a second injection of 

 these proteins. The sensitization by first- and second-day 

 extracts was constant and intense, that by the third-day 

 extracts was less marked and sometimes was not evident, 

 and that by the fourth-day extracts was only occasional, 

 and when present was always weak. Comparative studies 

 of the power of the blood, liver, and kidney to sensitize 

 indicate that this sensitization depends upon the content 

 of the foreign protein in the circulatory blood and not upon 

 its accumulation or fixation in the tissues of an organ. This 

 opinion is supported by other experiments in which the 

 sensitizing power of the blood and of the extracts of unwashed 

 kidneys was compared with the sensitizing power of washed 

 kidneys. The weak sensitizing power of washed kidney 

 extract is taken as evidence that foreign proteins of the 

 kinds used are not held in the tissues of the kidney, and if 

 these results may be applied to nephrotoxic proteins, it 

 follows that nephritis is not due to selection and persisting 

 fixation of a protein by the renal cells, but is due to the 

 action of such proteins merely during the process of elimina- 



1 Jour. Med. Research, 1911, xxv, 399. 



2 Jour. Exp. Med., 1912, xvi, 349. 



